The Vulcan Disaster

She was nude as Eve. More so: her long-limbed, flawless body was totally hairless. The wig was gone; all that remained was a tight cap of short hair, trimmed to just below the ears in a kind of cloche cut. It called attention to the piquant lovliness of her face, as the stark nudity called attention to the unblemished perfection of her golden-tanned body.

Her dance — if you could call it that — was as still and quiet as the music was loud and visceral. Her movements were as measured as the flashes and stabs of light were jagged and unsettling. The effect was to make her naked body as impersonal and sexless as a baby’s — and as compulsively and grossly sexual as that of an animal in heat.

Details? Her body was perfect, that’s all I could say. One only notices a woman’s good points when she has bad ones to compare them with. When she’s perfect, nothing sticks out. The whole woman becomes the part you look at and hunger for. And I hungered. My throat was dry; I was having trouble swallowing. I sat, leaned forward, watching the slow and infinitely sensuous posturing of that bare and beautiful form as it lent its alien silence and peacefulness to the wild abandon of the lights and music to produce a third effect that took off at right angles to the other two.

Then sudden silence. Complete. Deafening.

And sudden darkness. So unwelcome that the former light seemed to hang in the air afterward, unwilling to be extinguished, the way the echoes of the music continued to sound in the total silence.

The lights came up slowly on an empty stage. I shook my head — I wasn’t the only one there doing so — and looked at my watch. When I did, I got a shock: the show had run for thirty minutes. Where had the time gone?

I’d ordered another scotch which had been held up by the club’s rules: no drinks served during the show. I got it now and watched my hand as I drank. It didn’t shake, but I wouldn’t have felt bad if it had. The maitre d’ came in view; I motioned him over.

“You had heard,” I said, “that Mlle. Tatiana had been followed on the way to work today.”

“Yes,” he said. His face was sober and expressionless. “I thought it best to put a guard on her dressing room. He will be expecting you, as the lady will be expecting you. I have, ah, attended to things.”

“Fine,” I said. I can tell when I’m being hustled for a tip. I shook hands with him, planting a bill in his palm in the process. Then I drained the scotch and followed his pointing finger backstage.

The bodyguard was Chinese, and he looked formidable: thick and stocky, with forearms the size of legs of lamb. He knew my face, though, and gave me a microscopic Oriental bow as he stepped aside. I knocked once. The voice, still low and lovely, said, “Come in.”

She was in the black robe again, buttoned up to the neck; as she sat on the low chair before her dressing mirror, only her slim hands and bare feet were visible. Her smile was friendly and appreciative.

“I did what you said,” I croaked out of a suddenly dry throat. “I enjoyed the show.” Brilliant repartee.

“I’m glad,” she said simply, motioning me to sit down. “One does what one has to, to stay alive. Which is, well, why I asked you to come back afterward, Mr. Carter.” The smile looked a little weary. “I make quite a good living here, but I have nothing saved. I have responsibilities. It could all go smash, you understand. I will try to explain as I go along.”

“You mean about the shadow? The guy who was following you?”

“Ah, Mr. Carter. It is not one man. It is several. At first I thought it was one of the Oriental youth gangs. But they are mature men, Mr. Carter. And terrifyingly armed. I...”

“Pardon me,” I said. “Did you say Oriental?”

“Why, yes. Should I have said otherwise?”

“No, no. I just thought... but no. Go on. You tell me.”

“The same men were after Hermann, before he took that last trip to Saigon. I knew something dreadful would happen to him. I knew it. I begged him to get out of the business. I asked him to...”

“Whoa, please. What business? Just for the record. I have to know if your information is the same as mine.”

“You know. Arms. Smuggling arms.”

“Smuggling?”

“Oh, perhaps that’s not the proper word. Hermann was more or less on the up and up. Hermann made, let us say, legitimate deals on arms, buying cheap here and selling dear there and the smuggling was all done here, on the way to Hermann, and there, on the way away from Hermann.”

“But something was going wrong.”

“Yes. There are always people who resent the middle man, and his taking his cut. And I think perhaps it may have been one of these who began having him followed here in Hong Kong as early as a couple of weeks ago.”

“The Orientals?”

“Yes. Why?”

“I don’t think it was Orientals who killed him. I found his body only moments afterward. All the evidence I found points to his having been killed by Middle Easterners.”

Her band went to that gorgeous throat. “Mid... oh, God. Them.”

“Them? You know something about this?”

“Yes. He’d had some disturbing calls...”